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Although it has not made an official decision, the National Mandate Party (PAN) has said it will support Anies Baswedan and running mate Sandiaga Uno in the second round of the Jakarta gubernatorial election.

Joining a coalition led by the Democratic Party, PAN endorsed the Agus Harimurti-Sylviana Murni ticket in the Feb. 15 election. Quick counts by several pollsters and real counts by the General Elections Commission (KPU) show Agus has been left behind Anies and incumbent Governor Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama.

“We’re still waiting for the official result [of vote counting] from the KPU Jakarta, but we’ll likely throw our support behind Anies-Sandiaga in the second round if the final result is like this [Agus loses],” PAN deputy secretary-general Dipo Ilham said on Thursday.

He said the party shared the same vision as Anies-Sandiaga and was of the opinion that the pair had more realistic programs. He stressed that the character and attitude of Ahok was not suited to PAN's ideals.

Dipo acknowledged that PAN had established communication channels with the Anies-Sandiaga campaign team.

“We’ll immediately declare our support for Anies-Sandiaga,” he said.

PAN executive Yandri Susanto also confirmed that the party would transfer its support to Anies-Sandiaga. “The party has decided that we will back Ahok’s rivals. There’s no way we would support Ahok because his character and attitude not match ours,” he said. (ebf)